One of the great pleasures of retirement is getting to spend extra time with your grandchildren, especially the preschoolers. Here are some tests to determine whether you or someone you know is among that company. You know you're a grandparent when you can't identify Alicia Keys but you can name all four of the Wiggles. (Murray, Anthony, Greg and Jeff, at least in the incarnation our grandson watches.)
Barbara Pack, community outreach manager for Carilion Clinic in Roanoke, is a grandparent. Over the past year, as little feet went pitter-patter across her floor, she realized that it had been 23 years since she had an infant of her own at home -- and that other grandparents might not know a lot about babies today.
There have been plenty of books and studies about parenting in the last 50 years, but only recently have there been studies and books on grandparenting. Grandparenting is not just parenting once removed. Grandparenting is its own unique job. It also is a transition in your life over which you have no control. When your child has a child -- an act completely beyond your control -- you are suddenly a grandparent.
DEAR ABBY: Our kids have decided not to have kids. Although we have no choice but to accept it, and would never express our disappointment or lay a guilt trip on them, we still have feelings about it. It's our biggest sadness. All the people we know have grandchildren. At holidays they have toys to buy, cookies to bake, dinners to plan. Our friends and relatives tell us that because we won't have grandkids we can buy ourselves something extra-special. It doesn't make us feel any better.
Whenever there is a day when several of the women in my family aren't grandparenting, volunteering, reading or whatever else they do, they get together and go out to lunch. This is all well and good -- until the bill arrives.
PROGRAM: COBYS Family Services, in partnership with Conestoga Church of the Brethren, will offer a free program for grandparents. The three-session Grandparenting Today course will be offered on Thursdays, Sept. 8, 15, and 22, at 6 p.m. at the church, 141 E. Main St., Leola.
DEAR ABBY: Our kids have decided not to have kids. Although we have no choice but to accept it, and would never express our disappointment or lay a guilt trip on them, we still have feelings about it. It's our biggest sadness. All the people we know have grandchildren. At holidays they have toys to buy, cookies to bake, dinners to plan. Our friends and relatives tell us that because we won't have grandkids we can buy ourselves something extra-special. It doesn't make us feel any better.
For some grandparents there are twists and turns in their grandparenting road. One is when their child divorces, the other is when their child is unable to parent and the grandparent must assume the role. Most of all, be there for your grandchildren. Let them know what is going on between their parents has nothing to do with their relationship with you. Reassure them you will love and care for them no matter what happens. Grandparents have a unique opportunity to be the constant, the haven, in their grandchildren's lives during this time of turmoil.
NEW YORK - Erase the image of grandpa in his rocker on the porch with grandma sitting nearby knitting baby booties while nursing a cup of tea. That was your grandparents' grandparents. Today, grandparents, many of whom prefer to be known by their other moniker "baby boomers" can be both hip and helpful.
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